barklife episode 9: team human or, much ado about olympics

right. so i (jahnna) have taken over the show notes. at least for now. 

so this week, josh told me that i oughtn’t envision a more just and equitable world because that’s a big ask, so i started smaller by envisioning a more just and equitable olympics. we discussed the inequities in some money for medals programs (particularly canada’s), and it turned out that josh didn’t know money for medals was a thing at all. maybe you didn’t either.

further reading on money for medals and disparity between olympics and paralympics can be found here→ forbes: these 12 countries will pay their olympians six-figure bonuses for winning gold medals
bloomberg equality: prizes for paralympic gold medalists reflect inequality for many

and here is an article about canada’s paralympians in particular.

we also discussed the recent settlement in the soccer where the women’s team was compensated for lost pay compared to the men. the settlement is contingent on the resolution of a new collective bargaining agreement to address some other disparities related to working conditions. you can read more below: 

espn: uswmnt, us soccer federation settle equal pay lawsuit for $24 million

books mentioned this week:
much ado about mothing
atlas of extinct countries
magic: a history
how rory thorne destroyed the multiverse and how the multiverse got its revenge*

in our next episode, we’ll be discussing how the battlebots tournament is going so far and how far into the tournament we made it without having to rework our brackets. we’ll also give you an update on which of us is in the lead on points.

*from josh: i mistitled these books in the audio. i said metaverse, but multiverse is correct.

otis watching para cross country skiing
otis watching para biathlon for the vision impaired
here’s all three boys crammed in the backseat of our car. otis is not quite four months old in this photo, and was still small enough to wear his baby harness. they don’t fit back there together now really at all.

new barklife episode! “…except for the mongols”

once again, i (josh) intended to put better show notes in here. perhaps, someday, i will. guess you’ll just have to listen if you want to know what we talked about. it definitely involved mongols somehow. kind of. and some general life updates from casa harvey-groft.

jahnna: i’d like to add a special thank you to john green and all the folks at crash course world history for the idea for the episode title.

i’d also like to clarify that i think modern russian history is more helpful than general russian history because russia otherwise follows a similar arc to other european monarchies albeit with a longer-running interest in strongman politics and the cult of personality.

also, in addition to mongols we discuss bowling for soup, and i didn’t mention my enormous love for the song “critically disdained,” and i should have. so now you know.

you also now know that maybe i should write the show notes and not josh.

otis and the olympics

otis really enjoyed watching the 2022 winter olympics. he viewed all of the different sports, and his final evaluation is that he liked all of them except figure skating (which doesn’t have enough noise and flashing colors).